The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus, and in particular, to an image forming apparatus which carries out collation processing with image information to be copied, and a specific image in order to prevent counterfeiting, and to a method thereof.
Recently, the performance of image forming apparatuses such as a digital coping machines or the like has been improved, and carrying out countermeasures with respect to preventing counterfeiting of paper moneys, securities, or the like has been required. Namely, in an MFP product having a scanner function, it is possible to prepare fraudulent image information of paper moneys, securities, or the like by the scanner function or the like. Therefore, in a copying function, a countermeasure has been carried out in which a function, which is such that the MFP product which is the copy source can be specified by a countermeasure such as adding a tracking pattern to the fraudulent image information or the like, is provided. However, in the scanner function, even if the aforementioned countermeasure is executed, there is the possibility that the image information will be processed after reading the image information. Therefore, at the time of fetching by scanning, processing such as replacing an image which is inappropriate for output with another image, or the like is necessary.
Then, at the time of scanning, with respect to a region determined to be fraudulent image information, due to the fraudulent image information being replaced with a mask signal such as a black signal or a white signal which is prepared in advance, the fraudulent image information is prevented from being copied.
However, in a conventional apparatus, in collation processing with paper moneys, securities, or the like, real-time processing is difficult, and much processing time is required. Therefore, after image information is once stored in a memory, it is necessary to again read the image information for which collation processing has been completed. Therefore, there are the problems that a dedicated memory is required, and the costs increases, and further, time for writing and reading image information is needed.